


But At Least

by yet_intrepid



Series: in our bedroom after the war [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: And So Does Everybody Else To Some Extent, Dissociation, Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, Gen, Guilt, Keith is a Terrible Texter, Panic Attacks, Post-Canon, Post-War, Protective Shiro (Voltron), Roommates, Shiro (Voltron) Has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-03-04
Packaged: 2019-03-26 21:44:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13866618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yet_intrepid/pseuds/yet_intrepid
Summary: He should check his texts, Shiro thinks, as he picks his way around scattered clothes and papers and alien objects towards the door. He should see where Keith is, if he’s okay. He should eat something; he should get back to his job search; he should clean the kitchen; there’s so much to do and it’s all so damnsmalland yet it’s harder than saving the universe ever was.





	But At Least

**Author's Note:**

> not a chaptered fic, but there may be other related oneshots--this was going to be a platonic bedsharing fic, but that didn't end up happening and I still want to include it in this 'verse somehow. based on and titled after "In Our Bedroom After the War" by Stars:
> 
> _Wake up! Say good morning to that sleepy person lying next to you._   
>  _If there's no one there, then there's no one there, but at least the war is over._

Shiro wakes slowly, for once.

He rolls over, groggy, and grabs for his phone. There’s no one beside him on the twin mattress, a now-familiar warmth absent at his back. The light filtering through the window is dim, too, barely enough to see by as he fumbles for the button and the display lights up.

It’s four p.m.

“Fuck,” he mutters, and sits up against the shabby gray wall. He’s got three new texts: Keith, Keith, Keith.

Fuck. Today’s Thursday, and that means Keith had therapy at...two? Yeah, at two. Shiro’s pretty sure, anyway. He can’t keep track of things very well anymore. They’ve got a color-coded calendar in the kitchen, which Pidge bugs everybody into updating, but Shiro hasn’t looked at it recently. For whatever goddamn reason, it stresses him out.

Thursday. Four p.m. Keith should be home from therapy, unless he went off-roading on his hoverbike to cool down. Lance should be at work; Hunk’s probably sleeping in the other bedroom. Pidge...does she have afternoon classes on Thursday? And where’s Matt?

Shiro doesn’t know. And that stresses him out, too, not knowing where everyone is. Back in the Voltron days, location check-ins were mandatory. Sure, they’d all broken that rule a few times, including Shiro himself. But as a rule, everybody knew where everybody was.

Shiro drags himself out of bed. They haven’t invested in bedframes yet, though Pidge is keeping a determined eye on craigslist, so it’s mostly a question of sliding off the mattress and then hauling himself to his feet. He stumbles a little as he does, because his foot is asleep, but just shakes his head at himself and takes a determined step.

He should check his texts, he thinks, as he picks his way around scattered clothes and papers and alien objects towards the door. He should see where Keith is, if he’s okay. He should eat something; he should get back to his job search; he should clean the kitchen; there’s so much to do and it’s all so damn _small_ and yet it’s harder than saving the universe ever was.

He should train, too. Work out, or at least go for a run. And shave back his undercut. And run laundry, too--he doesn’t know how much of the stuff on the floor is his, but it doesn’t really matter anymore. Nobody knows whose t-shirts are whose now that they’ve stopped color-coding, except that all the V-necks are technically Keith’s and all the biggest ones belong either to Shiro or to Pidge, who likes her t-shirts knee-length. But even the ones with designated owners are likely to end up on everybody else.

That’s just how it is, now. Like they forgot, somehow, over the course of the war, how to own things. Between bayard swaps and lion swaps and only having one pair of headphones on the whole castle, the idea of ownership fell out the window into open space along the way.

Shiro gets into the kitchen, with its unmatched folding chairs and third-hand table, and frowns at the pile of dishes in and around the sink. If Hunk wakes up to this, he’ll be pissed, and Shiro doesn’t have the energy to deal with anybody being pissed right now.

On the other hand, he’s not sure he has the energy to do dishes, either.

Come on, Shirogane, he thinks. Come the fuck on. It’s a tiny thing. It’s a tiny thing whether you do it or whether you don’t, even. Hunk getting pissed won’t be the end of the world. He won’t die. You won’t die. Nobody’s going to die.

But he stands there frozen in the middle of the kitchen, starting to hyperventilate a little. This is dumb. This is so dumb. Why is he so broken? He made it through for so long and this is so much easier and yet he can’t do it. He can’t, he can’t, he can’t--

“Shiro?”

Shiro spins on his heel, fists rising in defense. He stands there at the ready, rapid breath after rapid breath, and then he blinks his way clear of it.

It’s Hunk, and he looks scared, and Shiro’s adrenaline melts in his stomach like a puddle of acid.

“Hunk,” he mutters. “Sorry, I didn’t mean--”

Hunk lets out a long breath. “Dude,” he says. “You are so tense lately. What the hell? I mean, I know we’re all tense lately; things are kind of a mess what with readjusting and all, but like, you were just standing there and staring at nothing and like, are you okay? Did you have a flashback? Are you--okay?”

“I’m fine,” Shiro says. He shakes his head. “Just...stressed, I guess.”

Hunk lifts an eyebrow at him. “Keith have a rough therapy session?”

“I don’t know,” Shiro admits. Fuck, he still hasn’t checked his texts. “Just woke up. I can’t believe I slept that long.”

“Probably good for you, though,” says Hunk. “How many hours have you had this week?”

“Since Sunday?”

“Yeah.”

“Uh.” Shiro thinks a minute. “Just got about fourteen. So...maybe twenty total? Twenty-two?”

Hunk’s eyebrow manages to rise even further, like he’s definitely about to scold. Shiro swallows back some weird fear response and interrupts before it can happen.

“Look, I know,” he says. “I know it’s not good. But I’m working on it, okay? Gonna bring it back up in therapy tomorrow. Also I’m sorry about the dishes.” While he’s apologizing, he might as well get that out of the way too. “I know you hate when they pile up like that.”

“Shiro,” says Hunk. “You’ve been asleep for fourteen hours, right? Fourteen hours ago the sink was empty. It’s not your ass I’m gonna have to kick.”

Shiro bites his lip. “Shouldn’t have slept so long,” he mutters to himself.

“Um, have you forgotten that before that you’d only slept six hours over three nights?” Hunk’s voice pitches high, suspicious. “You gotta crash sometime.”

“I’m supposed to be getting on a schedule,” Shiro retorts. “That’ll never happen if I keep giving in like this.”

“Um,” Hunk says again, “alarms literally don’t wake you up. That’s not giving in, Shiro; it’s a sleep disorder. You need to see a sleep specialist.”

“We can’t afford a damn specialist.” Shiro takes a deep breath, tries not to snap. “Not until I get a job again, anyway.”

Hunk, wisely, doesn’t comment on that. Shiro losing his last job is less a sore spot, more an open wound, and this is the closest he’s come to talking about it (outside of therapy, anyway) in the month and a half since it happened. He’s not sure he can handle any more than a mention.

So instead, he forces a smile and gestures to the sink. “Wanna clean up together?”

“Hell no,” says Hunk. “Didn’t I say I had ass to kick? They are not getting away with this again. It’s going in the group text, man; that’s how serious it is. With _pictures_.”

“Hang on,” Shiro says. “Let me check Keith’s texts before you go in for the kill.”

Hunk groans. “Fine,” he says. “Gives me time to get the pics, anyway.” He pulls out his phone and starts snapping away, muttering comments to himself as he goes.

Shiro pulls out his phone, too. Clicks on the messages app.

 **Keith:** hey can u talk

 **Keith:** fck Shiro, cant do this bs anymore

 **Keith:** nvm gng to fly. back later

The third text is thirty-two minutes after the first two. Shiro digs his teeth into his lip because fuck, he should’ve woken up for this. Should, at least, have checked his texts as soon as he did manage to drag himself back from fourteen goddamn hours of sleep. What did Keith do in those thirty-two minutes? Shiro’s found him crying in parking lots after therapy before, or sitting dissociated on the curb outside the apartment complex they live in. Lance and Hunk go to their appointments at the same time, which means they can support each other after, and Pidge and Matt can always call their parents if they’re not doing good. But Keith--

Shiro bites harder into his lip and, with effort, draws in a shaky breath. He can’t tell Hunk not to put this in the group text. Keith needs to work on being a good housemate just as much as Pidge and Lance and Matt do, and Shiro isn’t the commanding officer anymore. He’s just a friend, one of a group. Hunk would probably listen if Shiro put on his black paladin voice, but he’s not supposed to do that anymore. Conflict among them is okay. That’s what his therapist says. Conflict is normal. Conflict can be healthy.

But Shiro hates it all the same.

Keith won’t die, he reminds himself. Nobody will die. Nobody’s going to die.

“Shiro?” Hunk says again, looking up from the sink. “Everything okay?”

Shiro makes an effort to stop hyperventilating. It doesn’t totally work.

“Sorry,” he says. “I’m, yeah, I’m fine.”

Hunk stares at him a minute longer. “Whatever,” he says at last, with a huff. “You don’t wanna talk, okay, that’s fine. I’m just trying to help, but that’s fine.”

“Sorry,” Shiro mutters again. That’s the other thing his therapist wants him to work on, the apologizing. But it slips out of him no matter how hard he tries.

“Whatever,” mutters Hunk. Shiro watches him start sending the group texts, but mutes the chat on his own phone so he doesn’t have to read it all yet. Instead, he crosses into the cramped living room area and settles on their couch, which is probably a solid two decades old and has foam poking out of every conceivable corner. Then he texts Keith back.

 **Shiro:** so sorry I missed this. are you doing okay?

 **Keith:** better nw

 **Keith:** is Hunk spr pissed?

The texts come back almost immediately, full of Keith’s one-of-a-kind abbreviations, and Shiro breathes again.

 **Keith:** nd r you ok? you wr finally aslp when I left this mrning hope I didnt wk you

 **Shiro:** yeah, I slept til four p.m. not ideal.

 **Keith:** you needed it prbly

 **Shiro:** maybe. and Hunk’s annoyed but he’ll calm down.

 **Keith:** omw. will hlp w dishes. grcy?

Shiro stares at that one for a minute, trying to parse it. He’s pretty sure he’s seen Keith use this abbreviation before, but scrolling back up in his texts reveals nothing.

 **Shiro:**?

 **Keith:** need anything from grcy store?

“Hunk?” Shiro calls. “Keith’s stopping by the store. Need anything for meal prep?”

Hunk looks up from texting furiously. “Basil,” he says. “Fresh basil? Maybe he should just buy a basil plant, actually, if there is one. Cheaper in the long run. I can venmo him back.”

“One basil plant,” Shiro repeats. “Anything else?”

Hunk hesitates. “No,” he says, at last. Shiro can see that it hurts him. “I’d kill for some real vanilla, but it’s expensive as hell and I don’t trust Keith to tell it apart from imitation anyway.”

“Fair enough,” Shiro says. He turns back to his phone.

 **Shiro:** get a basil plant if there is one? and go by the baking section. text me a pic of what kinds of vanilla they have.

 **Keith:** k

Groceries. Food. Shiro’s stomach snarls at him threateningly, and he sighs. When did he last eat? He had a couple handfuls of Hunk’s homemade granola before he crashed last night, but before that…

He can’t remember, which is not a good sign, because it means either that he’s been skipping meals again or else that he’s forgetting things. Shiro doesn’t like those options.

Not that the universe has ever cared about what he likes.

As soon as the thought comes up, Shiro shoves it down again. He’s lucky. His team, his friends, they all made it out alive. He’s lucky and he ought to be grateful. Maybe he is forgetting things. Maybe he is incompetent at caring for himself, let alone anyone else, these days. But he’s still lucky. He made it back to Earth, despite all the times he thought he never would. What he’s got is so much better than what he deserves.

Yeah, things are tough. He needs real physical therapy for his arm, not just youtube videos; he needs a sleep study. Everybody should really be in therapy more than once a week; everybody should be seeing a psychiatrist and getting the most effective possible meds, not just the cheapest ones the doctor at the free clinic downtown thinks might work. Keith’s got old injuries that the pods couldn’t quite erase. Hunk should be back in school, getting a doctorate or something, instead of working third shift at a tech center. Pidge should be at some prestigious university instead of in community college, where she’s frequently bored to tears with her gen eds; Matt should be able to publish the xenobiology research he’s accumulated and present it at international conferences. Lance should be able to fly home to visit his family more than once a year.

His team deserves--well, to say _the universe_ sounds corny, but they certainly deserve the best it has to offer. Shiro does not. Shiro is lucky to be alive. He knows that. Why should it matter if he’s only had a handful of granola in the past twenty-four hours or so? He slept most of the day anyway.

No, he decides, food is a secondary concern. First priority is a to-do list and some check-ins with the team. Also maybe going to the bathroom. How long has it been since he’s done _that_?

Shiro hauls himself off the couch, treks to the half-bath in the bedroom that’s sort of his. When he’s finished and washing his hands, he catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror.

And then he looks away. That’s how it is: somehow, over the course of all this, he forgot how to wear his own body.

But at least the war is over.

From the kitchen, Hunk and Keith greet each other in passing. Shiro remembers vaguely that he was supposed to text Keith back about something. Vanilla? Yeah, vanilla. But from Hunk’s enthusiasm, it sounds like Keith grabbed the right kind. Relieved, Shiro splashes cold water on his face, runs a hand through his hair, and pulls open the bathroom door.

At least, he thinks, as he steels himself to face the earth again, at least the war is over.


End file.
